On the Burden of Glass Masks
by Fluxit Aqua et Sanguine
Summary: I know it's a bad title... sorry.  Anyway, this is my narrative written for the movie version of Gordon Deitrich, because I adored the character, and wanted to make a voice for him. PLEASE read, and review if you really like it OR really hate it!
1. Silent Fears

**A/N:** I've... written something about Gordon Deitrich from V for Vendetta? Yeah. That's what happened. I own nothing that you recognise from other things, including one or two tiny _Hamlet_ references (as I started this around the time I was writing a _Hamlet_ term-paper for AP English).

I took some perspectives that might be wrong, as I wrote this during school for several months, and since I elaborated things in my mind without watching the film for confirmation.

I HAVE read the graphic novel of V for Vendetta, and, frankly, like the movie character more. Is it partly because of my Fry obsession? Yes. But Mister Deitrich WAS my favourite character _before_ my obsession, so, at least it's not entirely a pathetic thing borne out of adoration. XP

Hope you may be able to enjoy.

P.S.- After looking through the files here on 11 July 2010, I THINK that this may be the only thing with a real connection to Gordie... Will people read this without the intrigue of V or Evey? I suppose that I shall see. I was just intoxicated by the dichotomy of this very briefly-featured character more than V. Perhaps someone else out there may agree with me.

* * *

It all started with an idle comment, just two years ago at the BTN, upon what seemed, then, a normal day. Gossip, after all, has morphed into an accusation, so I could have heard nothing before of what was, in my youth, a topic that made the girls giggle fatuously and the boys furrow their brows to feign seriousness as their cheeks flushed to show the reality of their feelings. It was now something that could have someone "disappeared", gone out into the oblivion created by those nightmarish black bags forced over the head with a merciless kick down, down into that unfathomable mire of the government's "cleansing'".

One of our reporters came to me as I was taking tea outside of my office. We were chatting of the usual, mindless things that were "allowed" and not taken specially by the monitors roving up and down the streets: About work, the advanced subtleties of cream in tea and coffee- things of that nature, the sort that, when one recalls what freedom was like as I do, is a wonderful push towards madness. Somehow, losing my mind's normal mediating warning, we came into more personal things, and she, the deep-voiced, ever incisive lady before me began without any apparent pretense,

"It is odd... a man in your position and age without any wife to speak of." She spoke with measured precision and politeness, and smiled a large-toothed, white smile at me that made my actors' tact repay her in kind as a chill ran down my spine, fearfully... suddenly the fear that I should _somehow_, some damnable way be revealed and erased from the country's collective memory by threats of the same fate, became prevalent to me in a manner that I'd never experienced before, not in all my years in the business of comedic television. Glorifying the simple and the asinine aspects of what was once a noble art for eyes and ears so numbed by censorship that nothing more could be understood, let alone allowed... I suppose that it must have dulled _my_ senses, too, making me forget, for my business, that I could not afford to be truly private in my ways; my mask had to be painted to appear real.

"As a matter of fact, I've simply been working out the courage to have one of your delightful young ladies here over for supper," I had supplied genially, even before my mind had ceased spinning its shroud of catastrophic ends to our frank little chat. "Someone of my age can no longer trust in his confidence, you know, even when in so recognized a job as mine."

She nodded thoughtfully, and the conversation moved casually through to another topic, - showing me how deadly close I was to being in an utterly different way detected, because of my preoccupation with the matter, - and, afterwards, I was forced to seriously contemplate the proposition I had made for myself, staying true to my word, and passing an invitation to one of the inane, wide-eyed young secretaries as if I were the _normal_ man of my age, searching in vain for some thrill that may have been impossible to attain since I was quite young. Perhaps not even then, but, if that was so, in these days, I was _supposed_ to take advantage of my position as the second-most recognized face and voice in England. Now, I would, and for exactly the opposite manner I desired. The thought itself was practically torture, living such a double-life...

I made the most predictable choice, of course, to serve my purpose, and I had a very public proposition of a message sent to her through the BTN offices themselves; while this may not seem terribly much, the gossip over the matter came immediately. It comforted me. After all, before, whispers of suspicion over me had had to be completely stifled in those who may have had any, due to the severity of even speaking such a word in these days- now, I was safe in the realm of peoples' imagination of the "bad" in what was not condemning by law. I think, over the years, that people rather forgot to be suspicious any longer, because such obscene sin as _homosexuality_ was no longer an accepted part of our perfected society, free of filth of that repugnant nature.

She, - my sickening _"fancy"_, Alexandra, - was a curly-hared blonde with deep, ingenuous brown eyes and paper-thin skin, with a figure to rival that of a tightly corseted lady from more than two hundred years ago, aged herself only about twenty-three. I could not mind the silly sayings that ran to my office not minutes after the message was relayed and responded to well, the comments about my now-proven taste for the young and sprightly- the only correct way was to smile abashedly, to agree to the charges with some tentative mind that I had never shown before (which, truly, helped my charade) that I had the same carnal desires for the porous, bleeding flesh of a youthful girl, one likened to those even younger than she, and subsequently to the cloud of Heaven, as any other pure, God-fearing Englishman would surely share.

I heard all of this, the degenerative slop from my _own_ mouth, and recalled my house, with its secrets hidden away behind the wine cellar... I felt much like I was betraying something, though nothing had ever existed. I had_ always_ been alone, with my imagination, passed from the chains of my unbelieving parents to those of a society that evolved into a literally mortifying stigma as I came to be an adult.

What was more difficult was forcing some imagined taste for such things translate into life. I am an actor, - it has been so for much of my time grown, - and I regarded this as a shocking exercise. Recreating life as though it were the truth is what I do every day, but making this into a believable _self_ rather than my character... I felt like I was making a martyr of myself, condemning what little I still had left beyond my character to self-destruction.

At the least, I was well prepared to entertain, and cooked with the most extravagance I could, minding all of the products that had been banned that made the best dishes impossible, even with numerous creative adjustments. This effort resulted in boiled prawns with our charming, sticky mess of a butter substitute as a sauce, and some of my better white wine.

The girl arrived looking perfectly thrilled, and, in a way, I supposed that I could see why that was. It certainly was nothing to do with any actual attraction, no- this girl's brightened smile and cheerful demeanor were caused purely by the significance of her position, the first girl to be publicly coerced into dinner by the wealthy television star. She wore a too-short red dress that was, to me, scandalously tight and low, and clutched a leather bag in both hands down to her knees as her little voice barely pushed forth the shuddering words, "Hello, Mister Deitrich."

There was something weirdly endearing about that statement, at the worry of the common girl being judged by a "celebrity". It gave me a push towards a thought of reality for my manner with her, already dangerously turning my true self into a caricature, and I smiled, taking one of her hands to kiss on its over-soft and perfumed back.

_"Enchante, Mademoiselle."_ The words, words,_ words_ made me despise myself once again, but a moment had me back in the mind of my man. She didn't seem to notice a bit of my distraction and merely let out an insufferable giggle she undoubtedly found sweet, judging by the way her translucent skin colored with blood. "Please, Miss Alexandra, call me Gordon. I have made a charming meal for us. Come inside." I led her to the table and proceeded to pour the pale wine for each of us, to which she laughed softly again with nerves I did not comprehend. I supposed I had done something mildly suggestive, and, once again, as with the rumors earlier that day, I was perversely happy to be able to quell whatever suspicion was possible by becoming overtly and openly the opposite of what I was. If I was an obscene, garishly forward lover of women, what credence could be given to the concept that I instead loved men?

I sat down before her after a time, and gazed at the lady with a lessened smile across the table. I could see her flush noticeably again, and she sipped her champagne flute with an attempt at a delicate show that made her appear rather foolish- it made me wonder how very farcical my own attempt at pretending was… I guess that it was lucky, in a way, that I kept to myself outside of my work and my television show, that no-one really knew my "true" nature enough to discern that I was making changes.

I had some appreciation for her appearance- she was quite lovely, in the most glorified of ways in these days, with small features but for her eyes, and a mane of wheat-colored curls that hung so far as her chin. It was amazing, to me, to imagine the wonderful contrast between myself and any other man, just then. That I could find myself merely appreciative of a beauty while _he_- my man- may have already shuddered with a base anticipation for her presence in my home, and proximity to my bedroom. As I briefly lost him, in thinking from my outer consciousness, I was able to fixate briefly upon one thing, - pathetic as it was, - to keep my supposed attraction alive; this was provided in the form of her particularly virile, dark eyebrows. The ominous quiet that fell between us worked well to my advantage, in this regard, frankly observing her. With a touch of jocularity, I chided myself for being beyond homosexual in sexual perplexity, finding something to lust over in a lady's eyebrows.

"Eat, please, Mademoiselle Alexandra," I bid her in a smooth, deepened voice, surprising myself with the ability to smile as my entire nature howled against me for doing wrong. "I made this especially for you- there was a rumor passed onto me that you care for seafood- what little we get in these days. Please- I would hate to think that a lady so beautiful as yourself refused me, in this manner." The child laughed inanely once more, and, again, she proved herself the opposite of my desire, that of a strong, broad and free thinking man of passion and intelligence. Sitting with this young lady, I felt much like I was being put to death by way of strings of cloying, molten sugar forced down my throat to burn a warm, agonizing hole into my intestines.

I chatted to her about whatever came into my mind, refilling her wine glass whenever it turned low and drinking conspicuously little myself, in a sordid effort to keep myself quite aware- not to slip into any position of shedding my mask. Alexandra didn't care, of course, as she didn't seem to care for anything but our words, hanging languorously and rather nauseatingly upon each of mine. Life at the BTN punctuated by more necessary comment upon her loveliness and her minute amount of wit. She showed me some, beyond her unpleasant pandering, but certainly not enough to have me be moved by her in terms of thought- let alone anything else.

The end of our dinner arrived faster than I thought was quite possible, with the dread I had been laying upon the event all day, and I found myself caught in a dilemma like an unsuspecting vole passed by a trap-door spider- just as wide-eyed and uncomprehending that I had managed to pass by a situation I that I thought had no danger into something that alluded to death. What was to be done with the bright little lady, to enforce myself just enough to prevent suspicion, but not far enough to unnerve myself with the disgust of forcing my nature to what it desired, at most, to appreciate from afar?

"Come with me to the parlor, Mademoiselle Alexandra," I suggested pleasantly, taking one of her hands to sit us before the fireplace in my living room, bringing an arm around her with warmth and working to bring out that kind of word I had decided, once, that I would only spill when in love. Once again, I was markedly sacrificing my reality for something false, and it badly stung. It does even more, in these days. "You are wonderfully lovely, Miss Alexandra. I've not met someone like you for some time…. You are so like an angel, my sweet…." I came forward to her amorously, much as if I had taken so much wine as she and fallen into a stupor that forced "truth" out, and pressed our lips together. The child, - to my surprise, and partial revulsion, - gladly accepted the gesture, and drew back to meet my probably terrified light blue eyes through her sharp, fire-bright dark ones, and I felt something awfully _real_ in hers that made some sense of guilt come forth for my scheming. Not enough to draw forth the truth- not _nearly_. Losing everything, I fear, was too much for going out of my way in preserving the feelings of one sweet young girl.

"You're so..._ charming_, Gordon." Her young, fluted voice sighed in beauty, that which any man was supposed to adore madly, to be rifling for all through an arrangement, through a show of propriety where there was none… the fact that I was the very opposite, I now find amusing, but, at the time, I could hardly think beyond the shocks I had been experiencing. She brought us quickly back together again. And, just then, with a clarity of thought that I never achieved again during that evening, I felt that, as I had nearly no experience in sexuality beyond what one can provide for oneself in words and thoughts, she could have just as well have been drawing a dagger through my chest if she wished to kill my self. Only in this case, what remained was worse than what would have come forth if I had died... a paper-constructed shadow of a normal man as opposed to a rotting corpse. At least the latter would have placidly disappeared after some years...

Despite my attempts to convince through any means necessary, - affront, even, - the girl ended up leaving before things could come much too far, with the mild excuse that I was a gentleman of the heart when it came to physical matters. There was some childish, exceedingly awkward contact, kisses that succeeded to disgust me, and a wonderful show of forged reluctance towards her leaving my house, but, overall, success.

It was an _horrendous_ success. I suddenly had all the office buzzing, gossip running sieve through sieve from Alexandra down through the office and, as ever, never to me until things had been exaggerated in grotesquely humorous manners. I had gained the place that I desired just by a few hours with one lady. There would have to be continuation, certainly... the difficulty was the first girl, herself. I shuddered at the thought of having to make myself out to be a veritable _Don Juan_ with women, achieving my purpose and immediately moving on, but... if it served...

Each promoted my image wrenchingly forward, of course, with a new girl every two weeks or so, charming each in the same sort of "private" way which made them feel quite desired when we were together, and minimally sour when I moved on- I expect, with some imagination of my reasons for doing so, using justification by way of my "busy" career, and such. They only drove other girls to receive me better when I requested new- it is amusing, in that way, that the young women enjoy my company so.

Their delicacy and their constant feminine sweetness plagued me- made me feel dangerously rebellious. I was drawn yet more obsessively by the day to one particular man at the BTN, a young reporter whom I had always felt vainly for, an Ernest Gage. He is a pleasingly short, slim-shouldered figure, with very thick and seductive black hair and a quiet, authoritative nature to match with his metallic and lustrous name; his likewise steel-colored eyes. I could easily spend a moment in his company talking of a report or something of that ridiculously insignificant manner, and derive an exponentially higher level of pleasure and fancy than that from the unnumbered multitudes of hours I spent sitting with a pretty, gawkish young thing with nothing to speak of but her contentment with all that was quickly becoming false in our lives. And of herself, and my character. I wonder if, had I been allowed to do so without fear hanging over my head so, if_ I _would have been so self-centred as that, to reveal most everything about myself without invitation, with a few hours and a glass of wine from a friendly acquaintance.

This I will never know, of course.

Work became a normal state again after a time as I cycled artfully through the girls at the BTN, as new came so close together that there was an endless supply. I felt like I was drinking myself to death, or consuming a gluttonous amount of a sweet I disliked, simply to feel the sensation of and resulting illness from excess. I was being a hedonist in the most repugnant sense, going so far as to gorge myself upon things that held for me no pleasure. I hated myself even more for finally beginning to release my guarded, tragic and willfully stubborn love for Ernest... though I knew there was nothing in it _but_ my love for him, it was, as I have expressed what seems an infinite number of times before, for the loss of a part of my soul more than my obsessive and impossible level of care from afar.

Even now, I cannot say whether it is by intrinsic or extrinsic forces that I am plunged into the deepest throes of disgust. Surely, my willingness to die so was horrid, squalid, and one of the most devastating means one could use to destroy, utterly; however, the response taken to such gestures was gross in its own manner. Within a month, the more cynical girls in the BTN offices had taken to calling me "Daddy Deitrich" (though I know for a fact that the ever-penetrating light of a star can melt the most frozen cynic, simply by my experience). I loathe that name for its complete misrepresentation, but that which I could never deny. I keep up my same act that was present in the beginning, tolerance, and wry acceptance of _"my self"._ I sound so utterly repetitious... I have mourned the death of my reality more in these passages than a requiem mourns a passed Christian man, yet I cannot help it. It is devastating in the same way... it is not as though I ever _loved_ my self, but at least I could have said before, with clarity and truth, that I knew of my own existence. I don't know that I do in these days.

The latter is true primarily because of the perverse rhythm I've fallen into, _intuitively_ calling for companionship with a female that is never more than an egotistical, self-promoting speech on my or the woman's end. The Christians used to say that they could cure homosexuality through prayer... I think it is more likely that selling one's soul to the devil is the only affective tool religion could offer, as I had done in my own, perverse manner. Whenever a pretty young lady came about, new to the BTN and subsequently still in the process of a mental osmosis which prevented her thinking too badly of me, I immediately pressed myself upon her by way of a smile and my address on a bit of paper- a wink when feeling indulgent in my passion for gamey flesh like hers. Such was the attitude I assumed when I made a proposition to Evey. She was, by far, the most lovely-faced (though awfully slight) and most intelligent child I went to prey upon- the only one who gave me guilt at the very thought of asking her over due to my respect for her ardent nature. I only saw her in menial jobs, delivering coffee and my tea and such, but our little association showed me a wonderful _fighting_ that I'd not seen in others.

I sound a bloody psychoanalyst when I look back, like I was sure of everything just as it came to me now that I expound upon it in the present. It probably wasn't clear as I say it was, my ability to assess human nature. But I somehow fancy it to be so now, this being my final address to whatever hands this lovely account has fallen into.

Still, there was definitely _something_ that I know I saw in her. There was disbelief in the others... _incredulousness..._ but never candor in a cause like Evey's. I felt, for once, to be overstepping bounds in asking her presence, and had the rather sobering feeling that, were I not mercilessly employing her as a tool for my image, we might have been friends. Allies, at least, in a common and disallowed stream of thought.

Perhaps I had hated myself before, but, on the night I made to prepare for things with Evey, the revulsion over the intricacy of my lies came to me more strongly than ever. I wanted badly to call the whole thing off, to see that she never came to see how much of a falsehood I represented without really seeing. It was only by twisted coincidence that it was all let off, of course, and I could nearly say that I _rejoiced_ in it. Exultant in the glory that is retaining a thing like purity between acquaintances when I've come into living a life of acts towards the opposite spectral end.

I wonder if she felt the same ring of triumph as I did when the Old Bailey was destroyed as it was. Her enchantingly dangerous presence at the scene makes me inclined to think so.

* * *

Meeting her the next day was something to look forward to. I felt so frank and so free, and the world was wonderfully clear, knowing that I'd not made my gross little act for her, and, now, likely never would.

I nearly stumbled in releasing my writers from the call we had on our troubled script, - which experienced awful flounderings at some times, when keeping within the government's pressing walls which were so charmingly and falsely called 'decency', - and ended it as quickly as I could for some opportunity to speak to the vision of Hellenic splendor, with her thick brown curls and strong face. I smiled as I always do, though, I am almost certain this one held something of a dry quality, as I felt, due to the pleasant, lightly manipulative words which came so easily through my teeth.

"I've never been stood up by a more attractive woman," my voice rang amiably inside my head, and revoltingly in the pit of my stomach. The girl trained her gaze upon me boldly, but her words seemed to fail, despite whatever resolution she had made for herself, undoubtedly preparing for this meeting as I had.

"I'm sorry, Mister Deitrich-"

"Gordon." Another forced expression of pleasure with her nervous mannerisms came forth and forced me to continue, "I don't need 'Mister' added to my name to make this body feel any older."

"Gordon," her voice repeated more strongly, and I was gladdened to hear it incited, that she became impatient with my pandering as much as I did myself. "I was on my way last night, but there were fingermen, and I… couldn't make it, with the curfew as it is." My face fell in a sigh, and I looked back down to her after a solemn moment of thought,

"I fear that, with the 'demolition' as it has been, our curfew can only get worse." The girl looked to me with more of an accepting seriousness, and I let her from the room, left to my tea and my thoughts until the fateful announcement began.

As I was during the sight of the Old Bailey, I was chilled, yet exhilarated. There was the fear of uncertainty, yet the gratification that responsibility was being given out with such efficiency. I was responsible as anyone- more, due to my influence, and my unwillingness to make any statement against the government's oppression of myself and of everyone else with the minutest complaint. There were things to be done… small things, which would be of use towards my cause. _"The_ Cause", as it were. I quite suddenly felt determined. There _was_ something to be done... all my life I had been hiding, first from myself and then from a discriminatory world. With this... I would begin in a slowly toxic manner, as lead accumulates in the body to kill when decades have passed. Allegory that only those looking for it could see, just as good could only be seen in this fatal broadcast by those who stood by waiting for a rebellion- a symbol, an omniscience to pervade the sleeping mind pressed downward by the utter denial of reality.

I was very briefly accosted by the police during the course of the transmission, being told urgently to evacuate the building, and something vague about a bomb that I cannot recall. But I refused pointedly. If one had the desire to be a part of something so large and so currently uncongealed as this... one accepted the mild threat that came along with it all for the sake of a larger being. When it was all over, work began again as normal, only with amore shaken, constricted way about everyone who had dared to return. My show was plain and typical, but we were all sent home at a curfew immediately after: It had been raised to seven o'clock. What a _marvel_ it is, how quickly oppression is accepted under times of national stress.

Coming home was something hollow to me. My secrets became something akin to madness, now that I felt I had some duty to something besides my few and rather lamely executed personal efforts against our government. And I had lived with them for _so_ long now... how would I ever be able to face one of the girls at the BTN again, when all I desired was to make myself known, not even for _acceptance_, but for the guilt of those who would think otherwise that it is impossible for a man of my nature to thrive in life and career? I supposed that I would have to stop my acts, lest I should make myself _truly_ mad (whatever that can be called). I had no need to call girls for any form of companionship any longer, anyway- I now had the backing of all people as disillusioned as myself- an unfathomable number. It could be every man, woman and child in Britain, or it could be just myself and that masked face on the television screen. As I had once, in adolescence, called myself a socialist, I finally had the chance to be one again.

It was in my home that I choked down the reports on the supposedly deadly occurrence that morning with an easing glass of wine, though my outrage continued to be stirred continuously as the progression went on, starting from the most mild and- fair is not the correct word, but I suppose it will do- and ending at ten with the God-damned _Voice of cocking London_, the most reactionary soul I ever chanced to meet. It appalls me; to know that the trash he spouts daily _is_ truth, for him. Not like my program, something created for the populace and to the limits of the government so that I can make my living selling lies, no- he_ really_ believes it all. I have a great sense of wonderment at how a soul could be so warped into a mass of goose-pocked flesh that has been immovably attached to its complacency in such views, and that something within it does not simply wish to vomit constantly, to purge itself of whatever is causing that stagnant blood to flow only in passion for oppression.

Distress was present with me through the whole of the parade, however, pressing his threading fingers throughout my thoughts, because of the disappearance of Evey. She was referred to irreverently on the news as another _'dangerous terrorist'_ who had been successfully captured and was being detained at a government facility for questioning... but, after the years of living daily with news reporters as I have, one can tell which words and which mannerisms translate into a lie. But, with our basically fascist regime as it is, the allowed news has to instill complete, utter, unbending, galvanized-steel confidence, which would be absolutely the epitome of decorum breaching to express even the slightest doubt against.

I worried for her. Though I knew her to have been taken by the character "V"- a whisper I had been passed along from my allies in the less-deluded reporters- I _had_ to worry. She had been such a darling child for the bit of time in which I felt I'd known her... and, while one appreciated the expression of radicalism when spoken, the thrill of fear that made it so appealing translated into quite valid, sickening dread when placed into a situation of real life. Perhaps he was so unstable in his actions as his words were firm and calculated. I knew basically the same phenomenon to be true of myself, after all, and the just-forged connection between that hidden face and myself brought me to be even more afraid for the girl.

* * *

**A/N:** Is this poor, random rambling I did to keep myself entertained when not working during my senior year in High School? Yes.

Will you review it, despite being poor, and random?

..._Please?_ 8D Even if you really dislike it. ANY COMMENT AT ALL, I BEG YOU. I just want SOME feedback before I go posting the rest, as it's all already written.

Cheers!

-_Raven_


	2. Renaissance

**A/N:** For some reason (that reason being that, in my time zone, it is currently Guy Fawkes Day) I've decided to post a little more of this. I admit to not thinking it very good, given that I wrote it two years ago and believe I've improved since that point, but... I'm going to post some more anyway. NYAAH.

Quotage done from the film here is not exact, as I didn't really reference the film for it, because I am lazy, and just plain lame. If my paraphrase bothers you, I apologize.

I own nothing, of course. Just enjoy writing silly, often-contrived fanfiction. Perhaps you'll enjoy it! 8D

* * *

Some time passed before I heard from Evey again, and, I am ashamed to say, there came a point when I had ceased to think of her all. The a few came during the news sometimes, as one is hearing new reports about how many threats to the Fatherland that have been 'neutralized', and other meaningless speeches of that ilk, and the farcical quality of it all made me recall her.

One was also given a bit of hope on hearing of mysterious deaths, of the "Voice of London" I had been so vociferous against just the last time I chose to write. Other, seemingly unconnected people have died, too- but they were in relatively slow succession (if one imagined that it was a serial killer performing acts of murder, anyway), and too much was covered up for these incidents to give me any_ real_ hope. With this lack of drive, fueled by the absence of Evey and these maddeningly random deaths, I also arrived at a point at which I assumed her to be dead, as she had not appeared for almost two weeks, and… even in the past, when I was growing up, most reasonable searches for missing persons were generally given up after one.

When she first disappeared, I recall questioning myself on my peculiar behavior, thinking over this girl so often, as I had done no person in the past. Allowing myself to be influenced so by her absence, when we had barely known one another. I suppose, now, that it has to have been something to do with her connection to the entirety of our cause. If she came back, she would be, above all else, a tangible symbol of strength while that voice that still rang so incisively in my head and heart encompassed the intangible. Still, that seemed unlikely for the whole of several weeks while she was missing. I have to feel that the government delighted in the fact that she was gone for so long- after all, if she had re-appeared by the next day, the writers of our country's collective thoughts would have to come up with some sort of excuse for her presence, and that would _never_ do.

Luckily, it was several weeks before there was any word at all about her- about any visible resistance, frankly- and at the cost of a personal shock to myself. Several in succession, as the case was. I could hardly have been more surprised if I had been told, earnestly, that she was being held at a government facility. But, then, the surprise really was all in the direct way in which it came to me, as I have said, as it is the first time that I was given any focus as a trusted one for help, something_ human_, rather than something of the often-garish qualities of my character on television. I suppose that I truly should feel flattered in some manner, that she came to me for a safe house above others, and I suppose I am. But, then, when one has been gone looking for any chance to be safe, one has undoubtedly exhausted all options before coming to the last. As it feel so charmingly obvious to say, you 'always find things in the last place you look'.

There was absolutely no end to the shocks that Evey presented in appearing on my doorstep, in a great many layers, from the most explicit to those which fell from her lips that shook from the undoubted trauma of her recent escape, and the words which gave them a color and definition which I suppose had been previously unknown even to her. The frame of words can cause one to realize things they had not before, certainly, as I have already experienced several times in this very work ("work"- another example, when I could hardly say that this is really any more than ramblings, but the word connotes so much more). Her state of dress was supremely cofounding, at the first. Before, I would have thought, on hearing that she was to come to me in this way, after a long and toiling imprisonment, that it would be much more akin to a man in a nineteenth-century workhouse than a twisted attempt at what I could only guess was a childish eroticism, judging by her luridly made-up face and her over-short dress- it reminded one of some of the crazes of my past, recalling as a young man. Hearkening back to the days when men found something desirable in Catholic schools for girls.

"Evey!" A great, started emptiness filled my mind, leaving me unable to grasp at any reasonable, articulated thought. "Good _God_..."

"I'm sorry, Gordon, I just escaped, I didn't know where else to go..." Her deep brown eyes shone up at me pleadingly, and lost her gaze to dart around the street briefly before returning laced with anxiety. After moments to recover from my distress, I stood back to allow her past with a word, that she needed to be out of the street.

"You'll want to change. I have plenty of extra clothes, though I'm afraid they will all be much too large for you..." I made an attempt at being lightly amusing- and recall it because of the unpleasantness that followed, feeling that I was being wrong in attempting such a thing in moments of so strong a seriousness- leading her to a guest bedroom to change, and was briefly confused as I saw her fairly staring at me, and moments passed before I understood the reason for her slightly scandalized manner. The last time she had been supposed to come to my house, I had been proposing a possible romantic enounter. Surely _this_, then, was perceived as an awkward attempt at an advance that I'd somehow not considered. I feel like I must have felt so trusting in her, due to her presence in our cause, that I forgot she didn't know anything of me, and certainly not my most damning secret... but, then, no-one alive did at that time, so I may simply be recalling my own thoughts wrong. I may have just scuttled off again with embarrassment and a muttered excuse, flushing and staring at the floor like a schoolboy with a fancy on his mind. One can never quite say, when attempting to account in this manner.

Soon she was out from the room again, clad half-amusingly, half-distressingly with my utterly disproportionate clothes hanging on her small frame. Stevenson's greatest novella, _The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde_, a tale I had appreciated especially in my adolescence, came quickly to mind, with the cynical addition that, along with the ill-fitting nature of clothing to parallel the situations, there was also a distinct reversal of the roles of the two sides of Jekyll. I was part of the larger body of evil, and sin, and she the small bit of goodness that managed to push through everything despite. So I felt, thinking on how I had given up on the girl, and found her perfectly well; still resisting. Though still trying in my small way, the null-assurance I was met with had had me more dispirited daily- I suppose that this is precisely the push forward that I required. I had, after all, been building up in so slight a way with each program that, with my hope now drawn forth by my good Mister Hyde, it was near time for the climax.

Of course such long periods of thought, standing and looking thoughtfully into nothingness, rapidly leads to an awkward feeling, and I hastened to asked her to the sitting room for a drink with me; practically as soon as I'd finished pouring her glass of brandy she had downed it with alarming speed, and the obvious and marked desire to calm herself with the lovely depression of alcohol.

"Cheers," I had remarked wryly, with a sting of backlash for my tactlessness; she either didn't notice it or brushed it off, however, in a similar rush to push out all her words to explain as she had been in my office the day after the Old Bailey had seen its glorious end.

"Gordon, I know it's awful of me, to have come here, but I hadn't anywhere else to go... If the government finds me here, you'll be in terrible trouble..." From my seat across from her, I could nearly sense the cold wracking guilt that so obviously shook her, and pulled at the child's mind. In an effort to console, I addressed her in a personable tone (of course, this being what I recall, yet again, one cannot say if this is certain, but I believe that I have ascertained how much I like to think of my own capacity for empathy as I put this account on paper), and moved to soothe her thoughts steadily, working to catch her large eyes that refused to rest on any one stable thing in the room.

"Evey... Evey, listen to me." She had refused to cease her stream of apologies even as I had begun speaking at first, and when she leveled her still-shuddering gaze upon me, I returned with a smile that I can only imagine reflected my understanding of her obviously great fear. Perhaps too much so. "If the government searched my house, you'd be the least of my problems." An understandably baffled expression furrowed her dark brows, and this time _I_ had to drop _her_ eyes. Revealing so much in this way to a person after thirty years or more of absolute self-containment... all that led up to this point made it almost painful to go through with, placing all my faith into belief that this young lady would not be upset or somehow weakly disappointed by an aging man's thoughts of what is a "grave secret" that would be, in these days, mere trifling. But, there was a small amount of comfort in the idea that it was unlikely for the latter to be true- if anything, I might instead shock her with my radicalism not at all present in my TV personality (until very recently, anyway).

A sigh escaped me from the working of my mind, and I looked at her again, gravely. "You trusted me. It would be _terrible_ manners for me not to trust you." With the same imperious spirit possessing my air about her that had first arrived when she sat and began apologizing, I indicated she rise. Still watching me close, apparently more mystified than confused or distressed with the silence we shared, she did so, and I took her down a low set of steps to my now sparsely-populated wine cellar (as wine was rapidly becoming unavailable- apparently our government was under the impression that my people needed to have more of its constant comforts removed from it), and twisted the false bottle as a key to opening my concealed door with a ringing, satisfying scrape of metal that sounded to me- in my fanciful way- that it was in some way aware of its significance due to its pitch. Like, say, the locks on mausoleums might squeak and echo, or the lock of a bedroom door sounding light and consoling, like home. A pleasant little fancy of mine leftover from a generally normal, loving childhood, I would suppose, that was only ever complicated once I grew into myself.

I came inside first, gazing around the low-ceilinged room that could have had me executed a thousand times over, and the state still would not have been pacified to say that my punishment had gone far enough for a traitor, an infiltrator of the State. When I turned to look at Evey once more, she appeared yet more stunned than when I had first mentioned some dissent. Somehow, - from what I believe I recall, judging by what I've said already, and what I've yet to say, - her surprise seemed somehow lighter, this time. I pleased myself with yet another introspective musing: That, perhaps, through this, _I_ could be something of inspiration to her as she had thus far been to _me_.

"Oh my God," her voice breathed in wonderment, going to one of the posters adorning my far wall, of our reactionary Chancellor of State painted as the younger Queen Elizabeth. "That's God Save the Queen! My parents took me to see it when it was hung in Gallery Twelve. I thought Sutler had it destroyed..."

"He believes he did," I returned, smiling, pleased with her shock and, strongly, with my ability to move someone with my own efforts, having been under the distinct impression that I had been being a coward in hiding everything away… not taking action- or, rather, coming into it, - like Evey, but I realized with this that hope took signs where it could. I should have done so already, as it existed in the plans of altering my show already, but, somehow, it had never come to a real, coalesced thought until that moment. "It cost me more than this house… but no matter how bad I feel, it always cheers me up." I continued looking through the poster into my mind and the one beside it, - Coalition of the Willing, a conglomerate of the United States, Union Jack and Nazi Party Flags, suggesting that all were willfully pulling people under a hateful spell of fear, - and was purged in such a way that I could not think of anything in the room that she should not be able to see. The amiable girl's good spirit and the path she had been through for her progression made me feel completely free to her… once again, a feeling of trust had disillusioned me, something that I fear has happened several times through my life, and in terribly devastating ways.

"What is this?" I turned around and my eyes went to the book and then to her, so blessedly clear of anxiety that there was not a modicum of doubt in telling her something of my beautiful book- one of the many beautiful books that is considered wrong to be read, today.

"It's a copy of the Qu'ran. Fourteenth Century." She fairly snapped back around to me, her lovely brow screwed up again,

"Are you a Muslim?"

"No, I'm in television."

"But why would you keep it?" Her very lightly adolescent tones matched the manner of the question she asked me, obviously- which must have followed her age, and whatever had been driven into the minds of this generation- unable to grasp the concept of aestheticism.

"I don't need to be a Muslim to find the images beautiful, or its poetry moving." I explained to her gently, bringing yet more understanding of our pleasant comradery into my own thoughts, able to exercise some measure as a teacher as I had vague recollection of desiring to be a very long time ago.

"But is it worth it? If the government found this here..." Awe had again filled her voice and, for the umpteenth time since she had come, I was more proud of myself than I felt I'd ever been in the whole of my life leading up to that point- the feeling was greater even than being a secretly gay man on television (though, of course, this was a decidedly mixed blessing, stemming entirely from the adverb I have used, which dampened the pleasure significantly,) or even being told that I was the most-watched and second highest rated show on television.

"I told you, you'd be the least of my worries." Her expression had moved once more, from awe to a warm calm, and I recall her tone being so brightly gracious as I had ever heard it. It is strange, to remember the impressions of expression so well, _now_, at this moment in my life. It is as though that were all greatly significant to me, a large point in my existence, when I can recall as far back as the beginning of this whole thing... the war... the Great Chancellor coming to power at the head of rabidly cheering masses. How forging a friendship with a young woman through common feelings could stand out more? I guess that it may be something to do with what immediately preceded her, all of the false and repulsive half-friendships that still make me gravely ashamed.

"Thank-you, Gordon. Thank-you so much." I can hardly express my pleasure for those moments, still, thinking for a very short few seconds, that for the first time since this life had been begun in darkness, someone cared for me due to my actions and my manner as opposed to my wealth and my charming mask.

"It's all right." The pleasure was fast displaced by something else, however… the feeling that, while she knew of my resistance, I was rather wrong in my exultation about her knowing _me_. She did not. It was only my _politics_ that she knew, now, and, indeed, the beginning of her next return confirmed that unpleasantry in my mind.

"I didn't mean to stand you up that night... The night of the incident with the Old Bailey..." She sounded sweetly apologetic on beginning, with a real smile come over her once-wan face. Her gaze flickered to my side for some time, however, and I recall being aware with a slightly sickened feeling that I'd done something to make her darling expression shift, and made her sober again. "It all started, then... I was on my way here, and..."

My mind raced for a moment, briefly lost as to what she might have seen that suddenly made me too strongly liberal for her. Had I, perhaps, put up some sacrilegious sign that took a step beyond her comfort? I found that I couldn't recall, as I didn't exactly frequent my cave of illicit things in those days. Of course, when one is searching for the answers in such a frenzied way, looking to prepare oneself for the worst, one can never manage to find the true solution, and such was the way with me. I had come to convincing myself that it must have been some decrying of Christianity as I moved my eyes to follow hers—

And I found myself _much_ mistaken.

It was the wall I had half-forgotten about in my recent months (years?), and completely in that time in which Evey stood with me, a wall of veritable pornography, an array of colored and black-and-white photographs of two adult men in various poses together and unclothed except for revealing underwear, embracing and touching with a charged level of eroticism that, in my past, would have been nearly painfully physically evocative and now didn't produce a thing, except haste to explain its existence. I worried for myself, for a brief time. Not for her having seen, - I was instead, angry with myself for that, - but that nothing brought me a modicum of pleasure anymore, as I was shown at that time. I suppose that I'd given up. I had been a too-tall, long-faced and unattractive gangly mess of a boy at the height of my sexual "prowess", and had never even kissed anyone in an intentioned way. One had to give up after _some_ time, but I guess I'd never been aware that it was yet so absolute. It was a rather shameful creation for this fact, essentially, that I devised when I placed the room in, figuring that, if I had to hide my desires for certain types of barred beauty in my cellar, that I might has well have done so for everything in my mind that fit such a category. The pictures themselves, I well recall, were part of some ridiculous tryst I had been a part of when I was young and hopeful and controlled entirely by my hormones, posing as a photographer for two men older and more explicit than myself (a part of an art class in college that I took certain liberties with, though these results never appeared on my teacher's desk. I doubt if the two who had been the subjects were unaware of my guise, though). When I knew that Evey had seen these, I had no such comprehensible thought, no personal rationalization that has appeared so well in this... I was sucked into the guilt of everything so much that I believe my mortification would have been at precisely the same level had she arrived with me gazing fixedly at the wall with a hand down my trousers (although, as I've said already, the thought of such a repulsive spectacle as that even being considered feasible is a real laugh).

"Ah..." I was biding unpleasantly for time. "Yes." Her gaze, while at least removed from the photographs, worked a rather Gorgon-like spell on me, making my entire body feel like stone even as I sat on the stool before the glass case that contained my Qu'ran. "You see, we're both fugitives, in our own way." I could sense her incredulity even before she began, whispering,

"But...-"

"You're wondering why you were invited here to supper in the first place," I started my speech to her, my desperate, supplicant appeal to her mercy, with my eyes leveled to her lovely face, daring her to prove to me in her mind that she was not everything I imagined in the terms of benevolence and trust. The only way to go about this situation, I felt, was to know it properly, and I did not yet know _her_, as I already surmised that she did not know _me_, "if my appetites were for less 'conventional' fare. Unfortunately, a man in my position is _expected_ to entertain... young and attractive ladies like yourself." I felt more wretched the longer I spoke; as I had worked _so_ hard to prevent myself giving my condition any sort of diagnosis or looking-over for several years to keep away from the mounting despair, so it very easily emerged with this bit of encouragement. "Because, in this world, if I were to invite whom I desired... I would undoubtedly find myself without a home, let alone a television show." There were several seconds of silence. The darkness of judgment as she was passing her mind over what I related to her and deciding whether or not I was still a reasonable human being after it all- such consumed very easily, and nearly had me making some mad effort to repent even before she offered her thoughts.

"I'm sorry." Those _words,_ those two, blessed words... there was an undoubted, somber victory in them... that she _was_ all that I imagined, all that one could hope for in goodness. _Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus_, she _was_ the vision of what is Holy- or would have been, had I believed in religion so. I suppose my position is rather getting into my mind, making me so wistful of past events that I would turn to the Church to explain what I now find to be the sort of _'kindness and mercy'_ that could make one weep.

"Not as sorry as I am," my voice sighed, being so very depressive about the matter as I was forced to press my eyes to the lenses that refused to magnify, and showed me my useless life in its entirety. While it was a pleasing catharsis, a blessing, that she listened without apparent hate or disgust, I could and would still bemoan the loss of the life I may have had if the world could bring itself to tolerate. Even so, the fact that I was so ungrateful then makes me hate myself even further, now, since I've long lost that blessing of acceptance. "The trouble is, after so many years, you begin to lose more than just your appetite... You wear a mask for so long that you begin to forget who you were beneath it."

We shared a charmingly contemplative pause before,

"Is that why the girls knew you around the BTN? I mean, I heard a _lot_ of stories about you having them over, after you asked me. From Jill... and Dittsi..."

"Oh, yes. I do not hesitate to tell you of the shame brought on by those things. Not from the public, of course, just from myself. Ardent self-denial is a sickness in the highest degree; awfully exponential and perpetual in its symptoms," I remarked wryly, standing again and considering the now-enlightened girl with thought. "I began that grotesque ritual a couple of years ago, when I realized that I couldn't go on being a popular TV host and a complacent bachelor... appearances to be kept up, you know." Thinking of the insult this might instill, from the fact that this was what I'd initially used Evey herself for- which now seemed practically like blasphemy, like decrying one's Messiah, - I moved to correct myself, "I cannot tell you how grateful I am to have met _you_, though, Evey. You've given me such hope ever since the November fifth broadcast. All the work I did in my show's remaking was because of you, and this 'V' character... I'm glad that there's something I could do to repay you, rather than languishing in a soul's debt. The fact of your... acceptance of me... is enough for me to have to be indebted to you for the rest of my life." Evey smiled with an odd amount of embarrassment at this, something I'd never seen of her before, nor would see again after.

"I... don't know what to say," she returned in a hushed tone, hardly able to bring her dark eyes to come back up to mine. I fancy that she was suffering shock from suddenly being the receiver of such a leviathanesque gift of thankfulness. "I mean... I've not really _done_ much... and people have died..."

"Let's not discuss it, then," I interrupted lightly, placing a hand on her shoulder that was childlike in its narrow and generally small qualities, and walking us back from the room with the lock snapping metallically behind me. "_Venite_. Come and have another drink with me, Evey. I think this discussion has been sobering enough that we shan't be at all affected."

* * *

**A/N**: It's a CHAPTER. WHOO. May be posting more in the future.

But only if I get **_REVIEWS_**. (At least one, anyway.) One pleasant review would be good enough for me, so long as I can have something. Please?

Thanks very much for your time, et cetera,

-_Raven_


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